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For those of you unfamiliar with Dov Charney, the stuck-in-the-’70s CEO of American Apparel, let me bring you up to speed. Charney, a Canadian, started American Apparel in 1997. He sold his plain cotton jersey basics while touting the fact they were made in the USA by workers who were paid a supposedly fair wage. Hitting off with wholesalers and hipsters, his empire grew and his profile rose. Ever the attention whore, Charney began masturbating in front of reporters, openly sleeping with female employees and inserting himself into American Apparel’s sexually-charged ads, some of which he photographs himself. Charney’s carefully cultivated dirty dude image eventually caught up with him and he got sued for sexual harassment by several female employees (although most were settled out of court or dismissed) and he pissed off feminists and women alike when he said that feminism is “out of balance” and that “women initiate most domestic violence.” To top it off, he was accused of being anti-union, his business practices have been called into question and recently, internal emails were leaked to the press that revealed that the company, like, “almost went bankrupt.”
Yes, there is a lot to dislike about ol’ Dov Charney.
Charney’s most recent controversy stems from a billboard that showed a still from Annie Hall with Woody Allen dressed as a rabbi and “the exalted teacher” written in Hebrew above Allen’s face. Woody eventually got around to noticing the ad and is currently suing Charney and American Apparel for using his image. Charney recently released a statement saying that he has a deep respect for Woody Allen and that the billboard was not an ad but meant to be a “parody/social statement and comedic satire” about the “baseless claims that have been made against American Apparel and myself.”
Was it a social statement? Maybe, but the company didn’t get around to letting people know that it wasn’t an ad until two years after the billboard went up. American Apparel is also claiming that the ad was meant to show “how quickly the truth gets lost” with stereotyping, which doesn’t really go with the Hebrew statement on the billboard, but whatever, we guess. Their oh-so-intelligent explanation of why the billboard was meant to “break stereotypes” is probably evidence of the brainpower behind to slumping company. But is everyone right in treating Dov Charney like he is the worst person in the world?
Full disclosure: I used to work at American Apparel. I’ve even met Dov a few times. In truth, he didn’t come off as a perv or a skeeze, just a super-hyper 40ish-year-old man with a shrill voice who walked around with a headset and traveled with a special wooden chair. However, my unremarkable impression of him was not enough to convince me that he shouldn’t be controlling a company. The man is kind of an idiot. He employs and promotes hot but unqualified people in top positions (at the time I was working there, the New York/New Jersey district manager was a 17-year-old girl who lived in an apartment above an American Apparel store in the Lower East Side) and then either shrink away from firing them when they let their egos loose among other employees (one “driver” would repeatedly threaten a girl I worked with while we were both working in our store, but I was told the driver was “unfirable” because “Dov is scared of him”) or get upset when these unqualified, sometimes incredibly stupid people would sue the company after they had been fired in a less-than-professional manner. He relied heavily on credit to quickly open stores (he opened 187 retail locations in four years) which were often opened and run in a sloppy manner and had an incredibly high turnover rate–even by retail standards. All of this was done to create the illusion of growth (and, allegedly, creating that illusion of growth was extended to their inventory, even if it meant defrauding their investors.) Doesn’t this just sound like a great company?
Well, the thing is, American Apparel isn’t all bad. The store I worked at was great and run by hardworking people who had been working at that location for years. And, all things considered, that 17-year-old girl wasn’t the worst manager I have had in my long retail career. The clothes are popular among a key demographic. American Apparel places advertisements in local newspapers, online and in small magazines, thereby supporting local media and blogs. Even though Charney is notoriously anti-union, he does openly speak out for immigrant rights and he maintains a working factory in downtown Los Angeles while most textile factories have vanished from that once thriving industrial area. And, to be sure, it isn’t as if Charney is going around rubbing his penis against every female that enters his stores. He’s a bit of a skeezeball (especially as he now begins to enter middle age) but he isn’t a violent psycho. He just should not be in charge of running American Apparel, let alone a large company.
But why is Charney such a lighting rod topic among young feminists? When I worked at Jezebel, some of the readers were outraged when American Apparel ads appeared on our website. Many feminists boycott American Apparel because of their sexually charged ads and Charney’s very public run-in with sexual harassment lawsuits. The truth is, there are a lot of shitty companies out there, some run by even bigger perverts than Dov Charney, but we just don’t know about it. That doesn’t discount the fact that Charney has created a sexual environment within his company that often relies on the sometimes subtle exploitation of young women. I sometimes wonder why feminists focus so much energy on one company, when there are other large companies doing similar things to exploit women. Unfortunately, people aren’t going to stop shopping at a store just because the CEO is a douchebag and a group of feminists rightly decry his business practices. People will stop shopping at a store once the fad has dried up, and American Apparel is already showing signs of fading.
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Really interesting article! American Apparel recently opened a store here in Manchester, in England, and although I like it and I even bought a hoodie, it is a bit overpriced for what I can buy somewhere else.
He’s so sleazy and unattractive.
I’m a little lost as to why it mattered to note he is a Canadian? I’m originally from the UK but am currently living in Canada and I really haven’t met many people that were perverts or were terrible at business…
um, because he started a company called american apparel. and is canadian…
um, canada is part of North America…
dimwit.
I don’t think American Apparel is anywhere near slowing down, it’s more popular than ever in Toronto (which is in Canada- gasp!) Who really cares if the CEO is portrayed as a sleazebag in the media. The company is great, and the clothes are comfortable. The people who work at the factory in Los Angeles should be thankful that it hasn’t moved to Mexico, like just about every other factory.
If it wasn’t an ad, but a social statement, why even put “American Apparel” on there?
Not buying the argument. Or the clothes.
I don’t trust him because he’s Canadian.
Go back and read the article that was first referenced here (masturbating in front of reporters).
http://www.jewlicious.com/2004/08/dov-charney-jane-magazine-and-google/
The author has added an apology of sorts and further explains.
This doesn’t make me like him any more, but …fair is fair.
One thing I forgot to mention.
Canada is in North America.
Seriously, a pleasure to stop shortly here and find you engaged. Love to study your most recent postings.